When it comes to video games, it’s very easy to figure out what to do with games that are clearly good and games that are clearly bad. A good game will not let you go until you’ve squeezed every last bit of the experience out of it, while a bad game will eat at your soul until you get rid of it. But what are we to do with mediocre games? The games that aren’t bad, but aren’t necessarily good, either?
Feeling the Mass Effects
Up until the release of Mass Effect 2, the original Mass Effect was a game I thought I would never touch with a 10-foot pole. The premise of the game did not appeal to me at all. I was well aware of the pedigree that BioWare has in the role-playing game space, but I hate RPGs. The last real role-playing game I ever got into was Super Mario RPG on the Super Nintendo. It featured third-person shooting combat, which I like. But I also don’t like managing an AI squad and I also don’t like the idea that all of the combat is dictated by dice rolls rather than shooting ability. Ultimately, I passed on this game because it didn’t sound like it was something I would like.
Street Fighter IV and Why iPhone Game Controls Suck
If you’ve been following my blog for the past few months, then you’ll know that I am a huge fan of Street Fighter IV and a fan of iPhone games. However, like the thought of eating a steak topped with ice cream, the recently announced Street Fighter IV iPhone port has made me throw up in my mouth just a little bit. I can’t imagine this being anything but an absolute nightmare to play.
Girlfriend Gaming: Why Make Her Join the Dark Side?
Happy Valentines Day! For those of you in love, out of love, or in-between love, I hope that your Valentines Day turns out to be a good one. Up until recently, the majority of my Valentines Days were horrible, but this isn’t the right forum to discuss that.
Anyway, I thought today would be a good day to start what may become a series of entries from me that pertain the role video games have in a relationship with a significant other that I call “Girlfriend Gaming”. I don’t mean to exclude the GLBT community, as some of my best friends are GLBT, but I would not be able to speak well on the intricacies of that dynamic. In any case, I’m sure that anyone with a significant other can find something to relate to here.
R18+ and Why You Should Care
As a North American citizen, video game censorship hasn’t really affected the games that I played since Mortal Kombat on the SNES, famous for not including blood. Since that whole debacle, the ESRB was formed and pretty much anything other than porno games are fine to sell here.
Other parts of the world aren’t as lucky. China is more prone to ban games that touch down on political issues. In 2002, Greece temporarily banned all video game playing in public. The one country I wanted to speak on in regards to censorship is Australia.
There’s No Place Like Home?
Last time I spoke about Silent Hill: Homecoming, I focused mainly on how freaked out the game made me. It took a lot of will from within for me to overcome my psychological shortcomings to get through that opening sequence. As a survival horror game, I thought it started out really well.
Unfortunately, my mental fortitude hasn’t been pushed nearly as hard since. Part of that has come from growing familiar with the world. But most of my growing weariness towards the game comes from the game’s design faults and squandered potential.
Would You Kindly Read My Bioshock Thoughts?
With the release of Bioshock 2 only days away, I thought I would take a minute to reflect back on my time with the original Bioshock.
I vividly remember reading video game sites and listening to podcasts who were hyping up how amazing this game was. I didn’t care. The screenshots looked pretty, but I didn’t care that it came from the guy who made the System Shock games cause I’d never played them before. I didn’t care about the Little Sister dynamic. I didn’t care that you could add elemental powers to yourself to add variety to the combat.
Then I played the demo. Oh, my, God.
Welcome Home, Sonic
Sonic has had a hard knock life ever since his heyday on the Genesis. He had a ton of problems transitioning into 3D (which most people say the Sonic games never really pulled off well), he’s been held back by stupid sidekicks, his old games have been shoddily ported to every platform imaginable, his new games have been riddled with gimmicks, and he’s even been subjected to bestiality. Eww.
Welcome Back to Rapture?
The original Bioshock came out of nowhere for me. It was a game that was a getting a lot of buzz from the journalists, but from the little I had heard or read about it, I didn’t care at all for the game. In my eyes, it was just another first-person shooter. Then the demo came along and rocked my face into another planet. Everything about that game to the spooky atmosphere to the combat and the impressive plot progression of that demo had me sold. It was the first game to ever sell me based on a demo. I rushed out on the morning of release and bought it.
Unemployed Gamer
Due to circumstances beyond my control, today is my first day of being unemployed since I started working in 2001. I will be diligent in trying to get back on my feet, and I hope this spell of unemployment doesn’t last for long. I have been pretty good at saving my money and my expenses are relatively low, so I should be able to hang out for a few months if things get that hairy. I pray that they don’t.
